Achu Kantule (Osvaldo De León) was born in 1964 in Ustupu, the Gunadule Nation (Panamá). He began to paint, as a self-taught artist, in the ‘80s. In 1996 he won the National Prize for Painting from the Cultural Institute of Panamá. In 2001, he graduated from the University of Panamá with honors (Sigma Landa), obtaining A Bachelor’s Degree in Plastic and Visual Arts. He has had over 24 individual exhibits throughout the Americas and Europe, and has participated in various joint exhibits. In 2004, he received a prestigious scholarship from the National Museum of the American Indian (Smithsonian Institution). He finds the inspiration for his art in Guna spirituality and worldview, using the ancestral symbols of his people, which are very much present in everyday Guna Life. In 2024, Achu represented the Plurinational State of Bolivia at the 60th Venice Biennal. Achu’s art was the counter cover of our first volume of the Indigenous Message on Water.